An Attitude Adjustment

The next 3 years were nearly idyllic. We were young newlyweds with a terrific little boy. We had our issues, money was tight for one thing, but we worked through things as they showed up, just like all newlyweds do.

Douglas was almost perfect too. He was as crazy about his Mom and Dad, as we were about him, and the 3 of us bonded well. He was the ideal first born.

Before I knew it, my hitch was almost up. Originally, I was going to do my four years and then go back to Loudon, but with about a year to go I had to start rethinking that idea. I had a family now and that changed everything. I could still go back to Loudon, but what would I do when I got there? Plus, she wasn’t too anxious to be so far away from her family. So, if I stayed in California, what would I do? After a lot of discussion, we decided I should look at re-enlisting.

So I did. The only rub was my career field was full so if I re-enlisted it would have to be in another field. Yuck. Remember those military tests in high school that I thought were no big deal, just a day out of class --- the same tests that severely limited my options in basic training? Well, they took one look at them and said, “Unless you retake these and make lot better scores, we can’t use you.”

So I did. There were tests in 4 categories; General, Administrative, Mechanical, and Electronics. Originally, the highest score I made was a 30 in Mechanical, after the retake the lowest score I made was 75 in Electronics. So now when I looked for a new career field, I had a bunch to choose from, especially those with bonuses. I selected Weather and received a $5000 re-enlistment bonus.

How did I get so smart in 4 short years? I didn’t. I just had an attitude adjustment.

The downside was I was going to have to go away for 4 months to go to school in Illinois, but besides missing Barb and Doug, it was a really good time. I met a lot of good people and learned that I wasn’t such a dumbass after all, not when I applied myself,

Him

I cannot begin to image what a woman goes through when she finds out she’s going to be a mother for the first time. They have to have a lot more to deal with than men do, I mean we’re just observers; women actually do the work and run all the risks. But with that said, I was floored when I found out I was going to be a father for the first time, so I had all I could handle.

I could not believe the mixture of emotions. Happiness, fear, excitement, worries, you name it, and I felt it.

Was I ready for this?

Was it a boy or a girl?

Was it healthy?

Was there more than one?

Was my wife going to be okay?

How much more was it going to add to our already stressed budget?

Would I do a good job raising it?

What other changes would we have to make?

We would need a bigger apartment and a crib and high chair and car seat and clothes and diapers and on and on.

I still vividly remember the first time she put my hand on her stomach when the baby was moving. It felt so funny, but it made everything hit home. This was for real.

My wife and her mom started talking about the baby being a girl, and although I little girls are special; I wanted the first one to be a boy. So I told them in that macho redneck way, “Nope, the first one’s gonna be a boy!” And it was.

A couple of weeks before he was born her doctor decided to induce labor. I took her to the hospital and sat beside her for what seemed like forever while this IV was supposed to make her go into labor. Nobody told my son. He was more than satisfied right where he was. After 8 or 10 hours, they let us go back home.

On Christmas morning, 1972, she woke me up and said she was having contractions and it was time to go. I thought, “Wow, I’m going to have a Christmas baby!” Nope. He still had ideas of his own. She was close enough to having him that they kept her at the hospital, but he took his time showing up. She was there from 6 am until 1 am the next morning before he was born. I sat with her almost the entire time except for an occasional bathroom break and quick drag on a cigarette. Then, at about 11 pm, I wimped out. I was hungry and tired. I knew she was too, but I had to do something. I told her I was going to go to the waiting room and drink a cup of coffee and would be right back. I fell asleep.

The next thing I remember, a nurse is shaking me, saying, “Mr. Presley would you like to come see your new baby boy?” I literally ran to the recovery room. Now I know people say that newborns can’t focus on anything, but when they brought him into the room in an incubator, he looked right at me. To this day I would swear he knew who I was.

I had no way of knowing at the time, just how big of a role he would have in my life.

Honeymoon in Vegas

To say I was smitten would be an understatement. It was more like head over heels and most likely because she was just so unlike any of the girls I knew before. She wasn’t exactly wild, but she was free spirited, always on the go and having fun. In a lot of ways, she was a living contradiction to what I imaged life should be like. I would have eventually done most of the things I did because of her, like buying my first car, but it wouldn’t have been as soon as it was, or as much fun.

The “aunt” she was visiting turned out to be just a long time family friend, and after she went back home, my sole priority was to find ways to see her again. This led to even more episodes; like the Saturday morning I had to be downtown before daylight to catch a bus to where she lived and had to almost physically fight off an old gay guy hanging around out in front of the bus station who wouldn’t take no for an answer when he asked if I wanted to go to his apartment for breakfast (actually it was hell no, but he wouldn’t take that either), or the day I hitched a ride with a friend and while we were driving across the desert a group of about 30 or so Hell’s Angels swarmed around the car like we weren’t even there as they passed us and went on up the road, or the time me and several of the guys were out drinking and we all went to her house drunk. Her Mom couldn’t stop laughing at us, and I couldn’t figure out why.

So I got the car and we were free to go anywhere --- the mountains, the desert, the ocean, LA. We put countless miles on that car. I became a fixture at her house and even today, I count her Mom and Dad as two of my best friends.

Did you ever notice that sometimes when you’re not paying close attention that life has a way of jerking you back into reality? Or put another way, when you’re young and think you know everything, life has a way of showing you that you didn’t know anything. Well, take my word, it does. It’s not something that we hid from our families or friends either --- what happens, happens --- so I’ll just say that soon enough, we were getting married.

Honeymoon in Vegas. Let’s see. First, I forgot to pack the shirt I was going to wear, which was the only button up shirt I had, so I borrowed a friend’s shirt. If you look closely at our wedding pictures you will see my collar tucked into my jacket since his shirt was one of those with the long pointed collars. Then we found out after the wedding, that even if you are dressed up as a bride and groom or not, if you’re not 21 you are not going to gamble. Then finally, her younger brother thought he could invade our room later that night to sneak a smoke so his parents wouldn’t find him. We let him stay for one, but when he started to light up another one we kicked his butt out.

You know, anything that starts off like that is going to be a hoot!

California Girl and the Tennessee Square

With the passage of time, I adjusted more and more to my new home, albeit slowly. After the initial excitement of getting there wore off, there were bouts of homesickness and sometimes loneliness. And if that wasn’t bad enough, if you don’t find a way to deal those two soon enough, you can add stupidity to the list. That’s the only reason I can give for the dumbass stunt I pulled on a couple of my pen pals back home. I’ve never really obsessed about it, but even today I wish I could have found a way to apologize. If either of you ever read this, you’ll know who I’m talking about, so I do apologize.

Eventually, I did work my way out of it, thanks in no small part to one of the guys I worked with. He had moved off base and started dating the oldest daughter of the family who rented him a room. I can’t remember all the wherefores and whys, but on a some of their outings the daughter was required to take along her little sister, and I got picked to go along to keep the little sister company. We weren’t dating, we were socializing; she knew that and I knew that, but it was terrific just to be able to get out. Besides, she was 14 and even I had a sense of right and wrong, so she was way too young for an “older man” of 19. I enjoyed her company though and she seemed to enjoy mine.

That lasted about 6 months or so, and was instrumental in getting me out of my shell. Over time, she has became a “Poster Child” of sorts for me, and represents a lot of people who touched my life over the years whose name I have long since forgotten. Her first name was Linda, I remember that much, but I draw a total blank when I try to remember her last name.

Next was Lois, who was in the Air Force too. We only went out 2 or 3 times. She had a car and I didn’t, so it was a touch awkward, with me driving her car when we went out. But what the hey, at least I wasn’t sitting around in my room. And besides, along about then another friend was looking for someone to go to a party with her “niece”, who was visiting at the time.

There’s a line in Forrest Gump that goes, “….I don't remember bein' born. I don't recall what I got for my first Christmas and I don't know when I went on my first outdoor picnic. But I do remember the first time I heard the sweetest voice in the whole wide world…” Our first meeting was something like that, only it wasn’t just her voice, it was everything about her. Okay, later on we would be married, and she would eventually become my ex, but I’m not going to sit here, 40 years later, and pretend she didn’t move me, because she did. Our divorce does not change that. I even found it incredible she would go out with me a second time. I borrowed a friend’s car and took her to the drive in. I was so nervous I knocked down the speaker stand of the first spot I tried to park in.

That was the start of a whirl wind relationship. We did everything together, went everywhere together, almost constantly on the go. She was helping this kid from the hills settle into a new world; a world I never knew existed.

A Fish Out of Water

In so many ways, Southern California was the antithesis of Loudon. It was bigger; there were more people and a lot more was going on. Even the surroundings were different. Instead of the many shades of green of the Tennessee mountains, everything was the dull green, brown and grey colors of the desert. All in all, it was somewhat intimidating for a country boy, especially one like me who was a little bit on the shy side.

The town butted up against a mountain range that rose to about 5000 feet, but because of the smog, I was there almost 2 weeks before I saw them. I heard people talking about the mountains so I knew they were close, but I never realized how close until one day the smog cleared enough to see them and they dominated the northern horizon. They were no more than 8-10 miles away from the base. In all fairness, there was a forest fire going on at the time that added to the smoggy conditions, but it was an indication of how thick the smog could get.

My very first “Toto-I-don't-believe-we’re-in-Kansas-anymore” moment came just about a month after I got there. It was 6 in the morning and my alarm had just gone off. I had my feet on the floor and was ready to grab my towel and head to the shower when the doors on the metal lockers began to rattle. It started as a light rattle at first but within seconds, the doors were banging violently. The metal frame of the bed I was sitting on began to slide back and forth on the tiled floor. It didn’t slide that much, maybe an inch or two, but it was more than enough to get my attention. It finally occurred to me it was an earthquake, but I had no idea what to do. Should I stay where I was or should I run outside? I finally decided to sit there unless I heard running in the hall. It seemed like a long time, but it wasn’t any more than 30-45 seconds before the rumbling stopped. There was no real damage around the base, but there was significant damage further west near LA. Welcome to California, country boy.

I will admit it took me a couple of months to get in the swing of things and start doing something other than going back and forth between my room and work. Obviously, I had a lot to learn and the guys at the shop made it easier. They introduced me to other people and took me to various places. I saw the ocean for the first time and tried snow skiing for the one and only time in my life. I really enjoyed the mountains. They weren’t the Smokies, but they were nice. The trees were mostly pine so the wind didn’t rustle through them, it whispered. A very peaceful place to be.

California, Here I Come

A week or so before the end of basic training we got our orders to our next assignment. Most the guys went to their next training base but I was going DDA (direct duty assignment) to be trained on the job (OJT), at Norton AFB, CA, about 60 miles east of Los Angeles. Those going to other training bases went there directly, but I got to spend a couple of weeks at home first.

Obviously everyone was more than a little antsy by the time we left for the airport,  For whatever reason the bus didn’t pick us up until almost noon, and by the time we got to the airport it was around 1pm. In those days the military usually gave you a standby ticket. Everybody with a regular ticket boarded first, and if there were seats left over, you could get on. When I walked into the San Antonio airport, I knew I was in for a very long day as there were hundreds of GIs waiting for flights.

After I found my gate, I put my ticket on the counter as instructed and found a seat. A few minutes later, the lady called me back up to the counter. They had forgotten to note the time I had dropped off my ticket, so when she asked me, “When did you get here this morning?” I thought about how long I was going to have to wait there and then lied through my teeth, “Oh, I’ve been here since about 9 this morning.”

Whether she believed me or not, she accepted it and I was on the next plane to Atlanta. Those were the days you went through Atlanta no matter where you flew, or as the old joke said, “When you die anywhere in the southeast, you have to go through Atlanta on your way to Heaven.” At any rate, the Trailways bus dropped me off at Richeson’s about dark.

It was a little odd being home. Even though I had only been gone six weeks it was the first indication to me that people go on with their lives. If you’re not around, you’re not a part of their lives, or at least not as much as you once was. In the beginning that irritated me a little, but then I realized that I was going on with my life too, and it didn't always include them, so it went both ways.

I walked around town in my uniform once. That’s and unwritten rule, at least for some of the relatives. Everybody wants to see you in your uniform, but after an hour or so, you want to take it off. You had just spent six weeks wearing one every day, so it didn’t carry the same significance for you. Before long, it was time to leave again. This time was scarier than the first time. This time I was going to be gone almost 4 years, if not longer, in a place that was physically and socially many, many miles away.

I got to LA International at about 8pm that night, well after my little puddle jumper connector flight had closed down for the day. I would have to wait for their first flight at 6am the next morning. There is nothing quite like spending the night in an airport, especially one as large as LAX. In the daytime, it’s bustling with a million people but at night, it’s almost a ghost town.

The next morning it was fun flying low over the big slab of concrete that was LA and its suburbs. There seemed to be streets, buildings and houses for as far as the eye could see. Imagine Loudon to Chattanooga covered with houses, streets, parking lots and shopping centers, and then every road bustling with traffic.

A little while later, I had the non-pleasure of being of taken in by a slick taxi driver for the first time. I flew into Riverside and had to catch a taxi to San Bernardino. I didn’t know it at the time, but he took me the longest way possible. He also lied to me and dropped me at the main gate, explaining that they wouldn’t let his taxi on base. But then, in an example of the old saying that God looks after fools and children, a GI pulled up and asked me where I was going. He ended up being part of the same unit I was reporting to and took me everywhere I needed to go. I guess for each bad person you meet, there’s at least one good one.

I was given a bunk in the barracks, sharing a room with 2 other guys. It worked out because one was rarely around and the other one liked the kind of music I did. When I got to my shop, it wasn’t so bad either. Yes, there were rafts, but also parachutes and a fabric section that did upholstery. I’m still a pretty fair country sewing machine operator and have done everything from headliners in cars to seats and benches, and even clothes. Plus, each year we helped set up the planes Bob Hope used for his Christmas Tour, so we got to hob nob a little.

So I was set. It was a little bit like the Clampetts going to Beverly Hills, but I was ready for anything.  Wasn't i?

When Is A Church Not A Church?

Prior to joining the Air Force, 98% of the times I attended church, I went to a Baptist church. The rest were occasional visits to Methodist churches. I didn’t even go to the Presbyterian Church and we lived beside it for several years.

So when the time finally came in basic training that I could go to church, off I went without even considering where I was going. After all, most churches were Baptist, right? In what was undoubtedly my first “country boy in the big city” moment, I walked right into that church without batting an eye and sat down on the end of a pew about half way up the main aisle. If I had bothered to take more than a glance at the sign outside, I would have noted that military churches are used by all denominations, but all I checked was the time of the next service.

Everything seemed fine as I watched people come in. It was nice to see families again. It had only been two weeks but it seemed like a lot longer. Nothing seemed odd until the service began. The music started and everyone stood up, which seemed normal to me, but as the procession walked pass I did a double take at the two young boys in robes carrying candles. Okay, I shrugged, so maybe they do things a little different in Texas. Next the preacher walked by in a robe too. Well, preacher was what I was used to calling them, but this one didn’t look like any preacher I had ever seen.

When the music stopped, I knew I was in the wrong place. The preacher was no preacher at all, he was a priest! I wasn’t so naïve that I didn’t know what was going on when he said, “In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit”, and made the sign of the cross, as everybody around me did too. “Oh Lord,” I thought to myself, “How in the world are you going to get out of this?”

My only experience with a Catholic in Loudon was one Sunday morning when all the smokers gathered out in front of church, catching a last smoke before the service started. As we stood there a man walked up the street in front of the church, and two of the older men on the stoop were talking about him and one said, “He’s a good man, but he’s Catholic.” Up until then I didn’t know there were any Catholics in Loudon.

Anyway, as I sat there I could see there was no way out, so I stayed. I could have gotten up and walked out, but I didn’t want to draw attention to myself. In the end, it wasn’t all that bad. The congregation participated a lot more than I was used to, and the kneeling was a major adjustment, but I made it through. At the end, I did not go up for communion. I saw several people hanging back, so I did too. It’s a good thing too, because the sacramental wine would have really thrown me for a loop.

That was 40 years ago, and looking back it sounds a little like one of Andy Griffith’s early album cuts. The most ironic thing about it, is now I am Catholic. Go figure.

Smoke 'Em If You Got 'Em

Imagine it is right after high school; so soon after graduation that you can almost hear your friends talking in the hall and locker doors slamming shut and you can smell the aroma of lunch cooking in the cafeteria. Now, image you are picked up and dropped into a totally foreign environment, away from your family and friends and the safety of home, to a place that feels dangerous and hostile, where you are constantly pushed and prodded, and almost threatened; a place where fear and intimidation are the order of the day. Welcome to boot camp.

The first day there began with our training instructor (TI) flipping on the lights at 5am while banging on a garbage can lid and yelling at the top of his lungs for us to “Get the hell out of bed and fall out on the drill pad downstairs.” And he was only giving us 5 minutes to do it. Those 5 minutes was all the time we had to go to get showered, get dressed, make our bunk and secure our area for the day; in military order of course. To this day, when the alarm clock goes off, I am up and headed to the shower. I have never used a snooze button in my life.

The antagonist in all this, the TI, left no doubt in your mind that he was one mean SOB. It didn’t matter if you were 6’5” or 5’6”, he put his nose as close as he could to yours and started screaming. How you reacted was his first clue of whether you were going to require a little or a lot of his attention. In retrospect, it is amazing how efficiently it worked.

For the next two weeks, he was after us almost every minute of the day, and our entire world consisted of him, the other guys in my unit and a few acres of ground that he used to drill and drill and drill and drill us some more. Then, when he began to like the way things were progressing, he lightened up a bit. He no longer treated us like we couldn’t find our butt with both hands without his help, but instead he treated us as a group of guys who were coming together as a team, and we could be trusted to stay within the limits he set for us.  We got more breaks and they lifted some of the restrictions.  Breaks now came regularly with him shouting the command, "Fall out!  Smoke 'em if you got 'em."  If you didn't smoke, you just relaxed.  Either way, it was a sure sign things were getting better.

Our second weekend there we actually got to spend a couple of hours on Saturday down in our squadron area. We could drink a coke, eat a pizza, play pool, ping pong or pinball, or sit and watch TV. It was nice to spend some time relaxing, but it also gave you more time to think of home and everyone you missed, so it was bittersweet. On Sunday I got to go to church for the first time and live up to those silent prayers I had made over and over when things were tough --- “God, get me through this and I will go to church every chance I get!” Only I didn’t bother checking the schedule outside the church and walked into a Catholic mass, but that is another story.

One ironic incident occurred about this time.  The TI was chatting with us one day during a break. I had shipped out to basic with a guy from Morristown named George Taylor, while everyone else in our flight was from the northeastern part of the country. Our TI asked us about Tennessee and mentioned he had a brother who lived near Maryville. He said his brother worked in a small town near Maryville at a muffler plant called Maramont. For the first time I looked closely at my TI and his name tag and realized his brother was my old supervisor at Maramont.  The one I had some issues with. I didn’t mention I knew his brother.

Another event with ties to back home came back to haunt me. During senior year, military recruiters came to the school to administer tests to those of us who thought the military might be an option. I fully realized that the military might be in my future, but being the immature one who was thinking more of the moment, I saw it as a day out of class and the tests didn’t get my best effort. Sure enough, during the 3rd week of training they marched us into this big room with all the jobs the Air Force offered listed on one of the walls. They told us there were no guarantees, but they would try to give us what we selected from the board. The jobs list was in order by the grade on the military tests we had taken before coming to basic. Yep, those same tests that I had lazed my way through back in high school. It was also the first time I had seen my scores for those tests, and they were embarrassing. No matter what job I looked at, it was way above my test scores. Finally, out of frustration I found something called ‘Rubber Raft Repair’. In my scrambled brain I thought, “How may rubber rafts can the Air Force have?. That’s Navy stuff.” Take my word for it, they have a lot.

From there on, basic actually wasn't all that bad. During our last week we had to qualify on several things, including fitness tests, marksmanship, and the obstacle course. But overall it was fun; even counting the two rounds of KP we had. The last weekend we were there, they let us go to downtown San Antonio. The bus dropped us off right in front of the Alamo.

Even my job selection turned out okay. After graduating from boot camp, most guys went on to another training base for training in their particular field. Some of those assignments could be up to a year. Mine was considered on the job trainable and I was sent directly to my next duty assignment where I would be trained while actually doing the job; but more important than that, I would get to go home for two weeks first.

I Want You!

July 1, 1970. It was hardly a day that will go down in infamy, but it picked up my world and shook it like a snow globe. Everything I knew was scattered hither and yon. This was the day of the draft lottery, and my birth date came in at number 116. That was well within the target range. I had just started a new job a few weeks before and was making plans for a car and a place of my own.

So what to do? Either find some way out of it, or go. That seems simple enough, but I felt no urge to be shot at. Actually, my options were few. My screwing around in high school had left me with grades so low that any college deferments I might try for were out of the question, and I had no family situation that would keep me home. I was absolutely 1A material. Some of the guys suggested ways I could fail the physical but I figured the induction folks had already seen anything I could think of, and probably then some. I also had no urge to run off to Canada.

So the only alternative left was to at least get a little control over what I was going to do by joining another branch. I had no urges to be cramped up on a boat for long stretches either, so I opted for the Air Force. So, after the couple of weeks it took me to muster up the nerve, I went down to the old health department building and talked to the recruiter.

A week or so later I was at the induction center in Knoxville for my physical. To this day I remember the smell of the place. I don’t know if it was stale cigarette smoke, the medicine, or the stuff they used to clean the place or a combination of these, but it was strong and made a lasting impression. I got the usual pokes and prods. They looked at everything – mind, body and soul – and also look into both ends. And, like I thought, I was definitely 1A.

I rode the Trailways bus back to Loudon and waited for the recruiter to call me with a date. He did. Report back to the induction center on the 15th of November. It felt so strange leaving Loudon. I told myself and everybody that asked that I would be back, but I think deep down, I knew I wouldn’t be coming back. Not to live anyway.

At Knoxville, I stood in a room with 20 or 30 other guys, all going to different branches of service and lifted my right hand, taking the oath that would definitely mean there was no turning back. Out of all those guys, just two of us, me and a guy named George Taylor, were going to the Air Force.

We went to the airport to go to Texas, on what would be my first plane ride. It was an old Southern Airways plane that had the boarding ramp that dropped down out of the rear of the plane. I will admit to be a little nervous on takeoff, but it didn’t take long to realize this was actually fun. We made one stop in Memphis and then went on to San Antonio. On that last leg, the plane was mostly full of guys going to basic training, so they let us have a couple of extra beers even though most of us were underage.

After we landed, a guy in uniform herded us into a room where we sat and sat and sat while they waited on more trainees. They called us Rainbows, a name that became more apparent the next day when we marched around the base in our civilian clothes of every color imaginable, while everyone else was in green fatigues.

Around 11pm, they put us on buses and took us to the base. The first stop was a mess hall called Hell’s Kitchen. The food was excellent, and I was very hungry. Everybody was, and we ate a lot and ate it fast, which was good, because about a half hour later we were back on the bus on the way to our dorm. They put us to bed about 1am and I remember falling asleep not long after I laid my head down. Good thing too, because the next morning would start very early and be very long.

When I Became A Working Man

My memories of graduation are fuzzy. I remember all of us gathered in the hallway, waiting to process in, and I remember heckling a little when they announced Mr. Blount would not be returning the next year. My remark brought a comment from Wayne Poole. He looked over and said, “What do you care? You won’t be here.” He was right of course, and I’ve chalked it up to my “boy” side making one last outburst before I moved on.

But that is it. That’s the limit of my graduation memories. I don’t remember walking across the stage or the speeches or anything. Somewhat sad for such a monumental event, huh?

Somewhere around graduation, give or take a week, I applied for and got a job at Maramont. This was the first of only two times in my life that I punched a clock, and the symbolism was even apparent to me. It’s a simple act --- pick up your time card, drop it into the clock and then put it back in the rack --- but it meant so much more than that. It was a rite of passage to manhood. I was no longer a school boy getting paid part time wages for part time work; I was a man making a man’s wage. A productive member of society.

This was the second big step in a very short time. Now, I could start figuring out what I wanted to do with my life and set up some goals; a car, my own place, heck, even a wife and kids. Little did I know that less than a month away was an event that would change everything before I even had time to start.

My first job at Maramont was as a spot welder on the assembly line. The guy one station up the line from me put 3 short pipes between two flanges and sent it down to me. I took it and pressed the ends into a spot welder with 3 heads that lined up with the pipes and welded them to the flanges. I hated it. The first night there (I worked 3 to 11) they gave me nothing for protection, just said, “Here, do this.” Let me tell you, when you hit the pedal to trigger the welder, bits of red hot metal flew everywhere, mainly on me. By the end of the shift, my shirt looked like a sieve because of all the holes in it. Later they gave me gloves, goggles and an apron.

My supervisor didn’t act like he was overly impressed with my work and I was equally unimpressed with him. It was like there was a problem, but he would never say what. Was I slow? Was the work subpar? What? He never said. He just wasn’t happy about something. Finally, he said the thought I wasn’t strong enough, which made sense to me since the pieces weighed every bit of half a pound, but he was the boss, so he swapped me with another guy.

He put me on the boxer at the end of the assembly line and I loved it. It could get busy when the line was in full swing but I didn’t mind. I picked up the finished muffler, put it on a box, pressed a foot pedal and the machine folded and glued the box and then pushed it down into a drying chute. And when the line shut down for whatever reason, well, that was even better. I can remember a period of little more than a week that the line didn’t budge and I sat there the whole shift drawing my pay. Plus, Jimmy Brantley was on the other boxing machine and he had a way of keeping things light.

The Well Is Not Completely Dry, But....

Things have really slowed down around here, huh?  Call it post reunion blues or something, but it sure is slow.   I heard one blogger call it DBF, or Death By Facebook.  And that is not aimed at any Facebook users, the Lord knows I go there a lot myself.  There is definitely more to do over there than there is over here.

Anyway, I do think there's going to be a change in direction on here, I'm just not sure what it will be yet.  Maybe jumping into the time when we all started to become the parents.  The trials and missteps of learning parenthood, and getting used to that other person sharing our bed.  :)

What do you think?

My Other High School

As I’ve said a few times, I spent most of sophomore year and a few weeks of junior year going to school in Atlanta, GA.

In early summer 1967, I took a trip to Atlanta to visit relatives. I remember riding a Trailways bus thru Philadelphia and Sweetwater and on down Highway 11, stopping at almost every town, no matter the size. I don’t remember where in Atlanta I was dropped off, but my cousins lived off Ponce de Leon avenue, in northeast Atlanta, very near a ballpark where a baseball team with the un-politically correct name of the Atlanta Crackers played. I doubt the field is still there.

This was my ‘country boy goes to the big city’ experience. I remember walking up to a grocery store, Piggly Wiggly I think, and stepping on the mat that automatically opened the door. I didn’t exactly jump when it opened, at least not physically, but I do remember a mental twitch as my head tried to figure out what my eyes were seeing.

I remember walking uptown and looking up at buildings that were much taller than any others I had seen, even in Knoxville! And I remember watching The Dirty Dozen at the Fox Theatre; a place that was awesome on the inside, with a Arabic motif that made the screen look like it was part of a huge mosque with minarets and date trees silhouetted against the curtains and different sized lights recessed into the ceiling, making it look like stars were twinkling. Arabian nights. I have used it as the measuring stick for every theatre or symphony hall I’ve been in since, and they all fall short.

Anyway, so later that year, after school started my Mom got word she could get a job in Atlanta, and after the pleasant experience earlier, I was all for it. This time we moved into a row house on Milledge Avenue. It was a working class neighborhood near Grant Park. From the street in front of the house you could see the stadium where the Braves played.

The school, Roosevelt High School, was a couple of miles away, a few blocks the other side of the park. Once through the park, we walked down a neighborhood street, and you had no idea you were near the school until the road curved and there it was -- a three story, ornate brick building. It even had a dome!

There are a few vivid memories. One of my classes was ROTC (rotzee) so I actually wore a uniform a couple of times a month. One of my teacher’s husband played on a minor league football team and on days she didn’t feel like teaching she showed game films from his games. And for at least one day a month, the cafeteria served catfish, cole slaw and hushpuppies. Loved it.  It's not there any longer.  The building is, but the school combined with another one and now the building is sectioned off into condos and is called The Roosevelt.  Heck, even our hold row house on Millidge Avenue goes for about $300,000, so I don't think it's a working class neighborhood anymore.

Things started becoming a little bit more routine by the time school was out and became boring. I didn’t have any friends that lived in the neighborhood I did so when there was no school I felt cooped up. By the time school started in ’68 my brother had decided to quit and was putting the same ideas in my head. I had been in touch with Wayne and Allen McNabb while I was down there and the subject came up of me moving back and staying with them. Their folks said it was fine, my Mom said it was fine, so I came back.

I still remember my first day back at good ol’ Loudon High. It felt great to walk in the door. I felt like I was back home.

Fair Day

I noticed on the News Sentinel website that the fair is in full swing. I noted before that we didn’t get as many days off as the kids do these days, but “Fair Day” was one that we did get. I have no idea why. Maybe they thought we might pick up something a little educational from one of the exhibits, or maybe the guys taking AG had something entered, or they just wanted to give us a day off. Whatever the reason, it was appreciated.

I only went to two of them, and senior year I had a date. My memories are really sketchy. I don’t think I could get to the fairgrounds now, assuming it’s in the same place, and I don’t remember anything really earthshaking about it. It was just your typical county fair with exhibits and rides and an arcade. I’m not sure what we could have won on that arcade, other than stuffed animals, but at least it wasn’t the little goldfish they entice kids with today. You know the ones in plastic bags that might live 2 hours after you get them home.

The only reason I remember I had a date senior year was because I was too stupid to take the pencils out of my shirt pocket before she and I went on the ride that would lift and then spin the chair head over heels. It had wire mesh enclosing it in case we slipped out of the seat, but this time all the mesh did was make the pencils bounce around on the inside (and off us) before they found a way out to barely miss someone on the ground.

I also noticed they no longer call it the Tennessee Valley A&I Fair. I don't remember exactly who, but one of the guys used to say the A&I stood for “a-holes and idiots”, but of course he was a little more blunt.

An Old Irritant

As I’ve said a couple of times, I have intentionally stayed away from negative things, especially when it comes to people. And even though this is not aimed at anyone in particular, it can definitely be construed as somewhat negative.

Something stayed with me after I left Loudon that took some time to sort out in my mind. In the end, I had to make a couple of conclusions. First and foremost, I had to accept my responsibilities in the issue, since it was useless to try and shift the blame anywhere. Nobody did anything -- at least not intentionally, and it certainly isn’t aimed at any student or group of students.

I fully understand, and accept, that I’m not the sharpest pencil in the box. Anything I learn I have to put the effort into learning it. Therein lies my responsible to everything I am about to say. No matter who tries to teach me anything, if I am not interested in it or care enough about it to learn it, then it makes no difference how hard they try, I’m probably not going to learn it. I think that holds true for everybody. But maybe, just maybe, part of the key is in finding a way to help me light that fire, and that’s the rub here.

In grade school, all grades were broken up into the A, B and C groups. The A group was the kids who made high grades all the time. The B group was the kids who made good, but not exactly sparkling grades. The C group was everybody else. What started bothering me was when realized these groups also aligned kids socially as well, or at least in most cases it did. I don’t recall any of the more affluent kids being in the C group and few, if any, kids from a struggling family being the A group.

Somewhere, someone made a determination. This kid is going to college so gear everything to getting him or her ready to do this job or take over that position. This next kid is bright, but probably not going any further than a high school diploma. He or she might take a vocational type course somewhere to get a specialized career or maybe take over the family farm, but not much more than that. This last kid, just move him along, use a social promotion if you have to. With any luck, he might get his high school diploma, but chances are we won’t see him anymore once he turns 16.

So that’s it in a nutshell. By the time you reached high school you were already channeled and didn’t even know it. Preordination might be a debatable theological subject, but it’s alive and well in the situation I just described. You are what they want you to be. Are there exceptions? Absolutely! But I would wager that in the majority of cases, the kid and/or their parents made the difference. They had to break this mold.

Could I have made things better for myself by trying harder? You bet. Could someone else have tried a nudge or a push? Yes. With the exception of Miss Stallings, nobody in any grade ever asked me what I wanted to be. Nobody ever took the time to find out if there was anything I was actually interested in. I reached a point where I was marked as this or that type student, and I didn’t know enough to rock the boat.

Contrary to how it may sound, I made my peace with all this long ago, and accepted it. It is also the driving force behind my wanting better for my kids and trying to encourage them to be whatever they want to be. I would like to think I was helpful, but only they can tell you for sure.

Look Back at You

Look back to that first really big crush you had in high school. Not the “I like them” type, but the one that made you sit and daydream about “if only”. The one you were slow to tell any of your friends about because you weren’t ready to admit it to anyone, maybe not even yourself. You know, the one you may have actually imagined being married to. Do you have them pictured in your mind? Now, look at who you married, (some of us may have to bring to mind two or more) and answer a question. How close are they? Are the one (ones) who came later anything like that first one that really go your mind racing?

Now look back at the way you dressed? Do you still dress the same? I’m not necessarily talking fashions because that constantly changes; although there maybe someone out there still walking around in bellbottom pants. What I’m talking about is the way you dressed more than what you wore. Did you use to dress up a lot? Sometimes? Do you still do that? Were you a jeans person back then and not so much now, or is it more vice versa?

Okay, this time look back at your hair. Do you style it the same way now as you did back then? I’m sure it looks at least a little different, greyer or maybe a little less of it, but is it still close to what it was at graduation.

How about your car? I know there’s been a lot of changes in cars, but is the type or style at least the same? Or have you branched off to a truck, jeep, or SUV? Maybe you zip around in a sporty little something or other. I could be wrong, but I’m assuming it’s at least not a standard transmission anymore, even if it was back then. There is something laborious about shifting gears these days.

Has the food change? I’m willing to bet it has. There are tons more eating places now than there was back then. Even if you still eat at home a lot, I think it’s a good bet your menu choices have expanded a good deal too. I am also willing to bet that if it’s just you and your spouse left at home, you both either fix dinner together and/or you don’t sit at the table all that much. You probably balance your dinner on your knee while you’re watching TV or maybe out on the porch or deck or patio.

I guess the point to all this is how much have you changed? Not all changes are obvious when you look at someone. Have you always considered yourself a democrat or a republican, or have you waffled because this or that person was running for this or that office? Do you go to church more or less now than you did back then? Are you happy? I will also bet that dying crosses your mind more now than it did back when it seemed like we were all invincible.

I guess in a way I’m answer all the questions myself, but I’m also betting that you may be very different in some ways, but overall, you’re still the same person I knew way back when.

The Reunion

In a word, the reunion was great.  The location was good, the food was good and the company was excellent.  Everybody looked great.  There were some I recognized right away, others took a minute or two, and there were some I simply had no idea who they were.  I'm sure they looked at me the same way.

They set up pictures for the basketball team, football team and those who went to each feeder school.  The music was mostly played low enough we could visit and chat and there was even a few who danced a little, including the Electric Slide and the Macarena, and no, it wasn't me.

Simply put, if you didn't come you missed something.  I honestly believe that everyone there had a great time, too.

Could it have been better?  You betcha!  More people could have shown up.  That really was all that was missing.  I heard a comment someone made about not coming because they didn't "live in the past".  Well, neither do I, nor does anyone I know.  We've all got way too much to do and worry about to live that way.  In fact, nobody this side of a psychiatric ward lives in the past.  However, I do embrace my past, and I firmly believe by not doing so I can't keep my goals in line or learn from my mistakes. 

I also can't deny the years I spent in high school, either the good or the bad.  So I look forward to seeing old friends.  Particularly those I spent the 4 most important years of my life with.  Besides, I don't have so many friends that I can afford to lose any.

Lastly, the committee did a wonderful job.  They put in the hours to make sure everything was covered, and it was.  The Friday night football game was a gem of an idea and something we could not have done if they had stuck to the June date.  Personally I think any future reunions should include one when possible.  My hat is off to each of you.

Good luck and good health to everyone until we meet again.

It's About Time

This will most likely be my last update before the reunion, so here’s hoping everyone shows up and we have a whiz-bang time.

It’s been almost 4 years since we started doing this and in a way, it seems that it has taken a long time for the reunion to get here, while in other ways time has zipped past. They say that happens with age.

I am anxious to see everyone, especially the regulars on here. I know everyone has changed over the years, but that’s okay. I know that Brenda still has the same smile she did 40 years ago, Kathey is still quiet and a bit shy, Donna has that mischievous sparkle in her eye and Tony still hasn’t met a stranger. I do have to admit though, that finding out Sylvia has a Harley was a bit of a surprise, but it also fits her personality. Anyway, all of that is what counts. Not looks, not riches, not position or title.

There is one or two that I didn’t have much association with, but what the heck. The more the merrier. And besides, other spouses are coming, like Bruce Blankenship, Willard McCloud and Janice Hughes Kelso, all of who I either knew or had classes with. Also, Kay Collis Gordon’s husband, Ken is coming and I know him from Memphis.

So all in all, I think it will be a very good night. How can it miss?

Work

There are obviously a lot of differences between the way the world is now and the way it was when I was a kid. Some things are as different as night and day. One of those differences is in what was expected of us. Today we push our kids and grandkids to succeed, to get ahead. Forty years ago, a Bachelor’s Degree was the exception, now it’s the rule. To set themselves apart from everyone else they have to get at least a Master’s or have a specialized degree. Forty years ago, interests were still more basic – like, how to live. It was still acceptable to quit school as soon as you were 16 so you could “go to work” and either set out on your own or supplement the family income. I came close to doing just that.

I started working for a wage at 14, and I was far from being the only one. There were at least a dozen guys on nearly every work crew I was on, and they were in the same situation as me. Before that it was whatever I could find and wherever I could find it. We weren’t starving, but there were no extras. If you wanted anything special, you worked for it.  Later on, I would work to pay my way through high school.

As a small kid, you could run errands for some of the store owners downtown. Rarely did you get money; you got a treat instead. But at that age, an ice cream cone or cherry coke was always welcome. Around the same time, my older brother got me to help him sell newspapers. So on Sunday morning we stood beside Tic Toc’s, trying to sell the Knoxville paper to people traveling through on Highway 11, and they would usually buy their paper from the smallest kid, so my brother knew what he was doing.  For my 3 or 4 hours of work, he gave me a whole 50 cents.

After you got older you tried to get your own paper route, but there were only couple in the entire town and they were taken, so you turned to mowing yards. There were two situations here, either they would provide the mower or you had to find a way to get one to use. Heaven forbid you got one that was hard to crank. After about half an hour of trying to start it, you gave up. For a normal sized yard you could get 75 cents to a dollar. If it was a really big yard, you could actually get 5 dollars, but it took you all day to do the one yard.

Next, you kept your ear open for any farmers who might be looking for help, especially around hay baling time. It was hard, hard work. I wasn’t all that big and it was all I could do to get a bail up to the wagon. I would grab it with my hands and then use my right thigh to push it up to the wagon. I went through a pair of jeans one year doing that.

Next, came a real job. It was called the Neighborhood Youth Corp.  I think we started out at $1.25 an hour or something like that. During the school year, we worked at school. During the summer, we worked for the City Department. Mostly I cleared weeds and brush from ditches and river banks, and got to be a terror with a swing sicle or a briar scythe.  I also worked the garbage truck for awhile and worked on the paving crew for a time, too. I helped build the road that runs beside the high school. It wasn’t much help, but I like to think I had a hand in it.

Then I jumped all the way to Maremont. That was really good money. I was finally making a grown up’s wage. It lasted until November, 1970 when the draft convinced me to join the Air Force. I made about half as much starting out in there as I made at Maremont.

If I have any regret, it is the time I missed socializing in high school. It’s not a regret I can’t live with and it has never really cost me any sleep, but it would have been nice to have had a few more memories of that “growing up” time of my life.

Excitement in a Sleepy Town

I didn’t live in a house with a driver until my late teens -- neither my mom nor my grandparents drove -- so if I went someplace, it was by foot. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t a lot to do or see, it was all just a little closer to home.

For several years, I think around the 4th of July, there was a festival of some kind on the courthouse lawn. I don’t recall the name, but I can remember it going on several years. There was a lot to do, but the highlight, at least for the boys, was the greasy pole. It seemed incredibly tall to me at the time, but I’m sure it wasn’t much more than 20 ft. They slathered it with axle grease or something similar and nailed something like $50 to the top. To a kid my age, that was a fortune, but all I ever accomplished was cleaning some of the grease off the bottom of the pole.

I also remember one year some kid had a Shetland pony with a fancy saddle. I asked him if I could ride it and he said okay, so I jumped on. Something was twisted somewhere, or the pony just had a bad temper, but he started bucking and I held until they got him calmed down. I might not have been a real cowboy, but I got my eight seconds – and then some.

Speaking of cowboys and horses, there was also a small rodeo that stopped in at the baseball field for a week or so. I only remember this happening a couple of times, but it was still exciting. I’m not sure how they set up, probably so they could use the stands and the backstop behind home plate, since I was too busy running around to really see pay attention.

I can also remember a circus there once. It wasn’t much of one that I recall, not like the Barnum and Bailey Circus, but it was in Loudon.

Also at the baseball field were ballgames between adult teams. They weren’t minor league teams, more like business sponsored leagues, but it was still fun to watch.  And right outside the ballpark was the skating rink where you could get a small bottle of coke and listen to some 50s rock and roll.

In the west end of town there was a small carnival that sat up behind the VFW a few years. Again, it was small but it was there, and you didn’t have to find a way to get to Knoxville or Chattanooga, or even Lenoir City. There were no dramatic rides, but there wasn’t all that many back then anyway. I do remember the chairs on a chain that would swing around so fast that you were almost horizontal, and the platform you stood on and it turned so fast that the centrifugal force held you against the wall as the ride turned on its edge. Like I said, nothing major, but still fun and exciting for a sleepy little town in the Tennessee hills.

Exploring a Small Town

When I was a kid there were times I would go to town just to go to town. It could be a neat place to explore if you did it right. Looking back, I am amazed at how many places tolerated me – or us, since I wasn't the only one doing it.

Richeson’s Drugstore was full of things to “look at”. Some of them were things I wanted; others were things I wondered about. Ernie Richeson never said a word. He knew I was “just lookin’” because I obviously didn’t have any money, but occasionally he would have an errand he need someone to do, so he benefited from my being there too. Most errands paid off at a single scoop of ice cream, my choice..

The dime stores were probably the most visited places. They were a cornucopia of wonders to a little kid. One and a half aisles were basically worthless since they had plastic flowers and “grown up” stuff, but the rest were toys, games, baseball gloves, and a lot of other things to wish for. Then, on your way out the door was a large glass case full of candy. Gum drops, M&Ms, Boston Baked Beans, Jelly Beans, and so much more with the unheard of price of 25 or 30 cents a pound! That was a fortune when you had no more than a nickel in your pocket.

One of my biggest life lessons happened in the dime store that sat opposite the bank. I was 6 or 7 and for whatever reason I was in the store by myself. I saw a large multi colored balloon that expanded to almost beach ball size when inflated and was thick and durable. I had to have it even though I didn’t have the money. The only option was to take that short step toward delinquency, so I stuffed the balloon in my pocket and headed for the door. Of course, the guy working there saw me and grabbed my arm before I made it outside. He kept me there while he stepped outside the door and called over the policeman who was standing on the corner. I think it was Boob Mills, but I honestly don’t remember. All I do remember is he read me the riot act. If his idea was to scare me, he was doing a superb job because I was shaking in my shoes. After a few minutes of a lecture that seemed hours long, he let me go with a stern warning. There has never been another time in my life that I was so scared, and no time since have I even contemplated something even slightly dishonest without seeing that cop standing over me giving me hell.

Another place of interest was the corner drug store. It was the library of sorts because it had a magazine rack and comic books. In the beginning, they were 10 cents, then 12 cents, then 15 cents. Those were major increases for someone of my financial situation, but I paid them anyway.

Sometimes, Charlie Arp’s store was another stop. His hardwood floors were always cool and he didn’t mind if you visited. He was another guy who needed an occasional errand ran. Depending on the errand, you might get anything from a Tootsie Pop to a soda pop, or even a Brown Cow.

Also, if it was Saturday (which it usually was on my excursions to town) and the weather was good, the streets would be crowded with people “comin’ to town”, especially by the White Store. That was when you met up with some of the guys you didn’t see very often. It gave you someone to run around with, which was a lot more fun than being by yourself.

That Little One Horse Town I Call Home

When I was a kid, Loudon seemed so incredibly large. Walking was the most common form of travel and from the west end to downtown seemed to take forever. And if I was walking toward Hospital Hill, the curve on old 72 going around the base of the hill seemed like a cross country trek from the traffic light at 72 and 11. You could probably walk to one spot in town from any other spot in less than an hour, but to a kid that’s a long time. Even the walks to school seemed stretched, especially if it was raining or very cold or hot.

I’m not talking about just in town either. Going to Lenoir City, Philadelphia, or Greenback seemed to take hours on those narrow, two lane roads, and anyplace beyond the distance of Knoxville may as well be on another planet. Now you can zip back and forth to those places with interstates or wide multi-lane highways, but do you remember what it was like before all that, when the roads were so curvy my uncle used to joke that the guy who built the road was trying to run down a snake. As I got older places did seem to get closer – at least a little.

The people were different too. You could always expect to see the same people in the same place, no matter the day of the week; except for Sunday and Wednesday afternoon. People worked their stores, leaned against lamp posts, or sat whittling all the time. Same person, same place. There was a checkerboard outside the fire station that was almost always in use, and you could set your clock by where Mr. Johns or Tater Watts were on their mail route or where Boss Wallace was in the trash truck. Not garbage truck -- trash truck.

Some of the older guys would kid around with you when you were younger, trying to get you to believe some of the most outlandish things. One tried to convince me that potato chips were cooked in oil made from a lizard’s back. I was maybe six, but I still remember it. He said, “Look at your fingers and how slick and shiny they look. That’s the same way a lizard’s back look.” I believed him for awhile, until my older brother called me stupid for believing that kind of stuff. Older brothers had a way of saying things so succinctly.

Anyway, when I go back now I’m amazed at how small it is. I see the “revitalization” efforts downtown and I wonder why. What are they revitalizing? The farm families don’t come to town in droves on Saturday morning anymore. There are not enough of them left, and besides, it’s easier to go someplace bigger that has a better selection of stores. There are no more shops. There are several eating places, and I think one place to get a haircut, but no place to buy a shirt. More than that, there are no people. There are some walking here or there, or stopping at the bank during the day, but when the business day is over the only people you see are the ones traveling through town.

Sad.

Remembering

I’m 58 years old, so the 4 years of high school represent 7% of my life. While sometimes there seems to be an abundance of memories from those years, it is still just a small part of my memories. Some memories will stay with me forever, some things I will never recall again.

Certain people and events pop up in the first few seconds of scanning through my memories and seem to cover or obscure some of the others. It’s funny how some memories are there, ready to pop up with little or no encouragement, while you have to pound through the layer of years covering some of the others to even get a glimpse of them.

Then there are those memories somewhere in the middle. The ones you think you remember fairly well until you talk to someone who shares the memory with you and they recall it differently. At first you try to correct whoever it is and tell them that they have it twisted, but the more you talk with them, the more you realize you’re the one with the different take on it. You started out remembering bits and pieces and with each retelling or remembrance over the years, you add more and more to them until they had to be the way things went.

I remember all the people. That’s not hard to do with a class of just over 120, but there were 100 times that many memories, far too many to remember. That’s why I like reunions. It gives us a chance to realign those memories and if you change them enough, they become almost like new. A totally new set that you can carry with you.

Steekee Creek

Have you ever considered the impact of Steekee Creek on Loudon?  I mean think about it, for such a small, meandering little stream, it has a significant role in the area.

Where it enters into the river is the only boat ramp on the river for miles in either direction.
More than one church had baptisms at that same spot.
A friend of mine drowned at the mouth of the creek.
It divides Loudon from Mexico, or the hospital hill area.
It swells into two small lakes before it goes into the river.
The lake closest to the river is the better fishing lake and also used to hold the houseboats of local families.
In the time before air conditioners it cooled a wide swath of Loudon.
The creek and it's bed serves as built in flood control.
It used to be the ball field boundary for left field and part of center field.
I almost drowned by the rocks just opposite left field.  David Ridings pulled me out.
It had some of the best crawdads.
It served as a watering hole for countless cows and crops between the river and a good 5 to 6 miles back into the valley.
I know of at least two fresh water springs that bubble up into it.
It was a playground for countless boys and girls who grew up around there, and was where a lot of them learned to swim.

That old creek is a good friend to a lot of us.

Another Twenty Questions

Who is at the top of your list to see at the reunion? 
Among those you want to see, who haven't you seen in the longest time? 
Would it ever be possible to have a 100% turn out of those who are still living? 
If you are not going to the reunion, why not?
Are you staying at the hotel after the reunion?  I am.
Does anyone live closer to the hotel than Brenda, Kathey and Sylvia?  (I think they said they live close.)
Is it still looked down on in Loudon to drink?
Have you paid for it yet?
Are you bringing your significant other?
There's going to be a DJ.  Will you dance?
Are you getting excited about it?
How far do you have to travel to get there?
Are you going to be early, on time, or socially late?
Which has changed the most -- Loudon, Lenoir City, Philadelphia or Vonore?
Which has changed the least -- Loudon, Lenoir Cityr, Philadelphia or Vonore?
Are you going to the football game on Friday night?
When was the last time you were at a football game in Loudon?
When was the last time you were at the high school?
Which will you do more - laugh or cry?
Will you cry at all?

The Home Stretch

For four years now the most common subject on the blog has been the reunion.  (Okay, so I have a one track mind :))  Anyway, it is closer than we think.  Almost 2 months, and like Delphia said, I'm getting excited.  I am honestly looking forward to cracks about my grey hair, my wrinkles and my weight.  At least I will know I was remembered.  Now wait, wasn't meant to sound forlorn, it's just that even something like that means something... well, as long as they don't throw in an S.O.B with it.

I was thinking the other night that this rickety old blog has just about petered out.  Sort of KBFB, but I'm okay with it.  Doesn't mean that I will stop posting things.  It does mean that I can change the subject a little and who knows, I might even let a zinger or two go that I've been telling myself isn't meant to be posted here.  Nah.  Those are still safe with me.

I am looking forward to seeing all you regulars so much.  It's going to be odd walking into a reunion and have all these rekindled friendships.  At most of the other reunions I had to relearn everybody, and they had to relearn me.

"I have been, and always will be, your friend."  --  Spock

A Look Back - June 1970

June 1 – Soyuz 9, a two man spacecraft, is launched in the Soviet Union.

June 2 – Norway announces that it has rich oil deposits off its North Sea coast.

June 4 – Tonga gains independence from the United Kingdom.

June 5 -- The Loudon High School Class of 1970 graduates

June 6 – A D-Day celebration is held in Washington, D.C..

June 7 – The Who become the first act to perform rock music (their rock opera, Tommy) at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York.

June 8 – A coup in Argentina brings a new junta of service chiefs; on June 18, Roberto M. Levingston becomes President.

June 10 – U.S. President Richard Nixon signs a measure lowering the voting age to 18.

June 11 – The United States gets its first female generals: Anna Mae Hays and Elizabeth P. Hoisington.

June 12 – N.D.F.L.O.A.G. guerrillas attack military garrisons at Izki and Nizwa in Oman.

June 18 – United Kingdom general election, 1970: the Conservative Party wins and Edward Heath becomes Prime Minister.

June 21 -- Brazil defeats Italy 4–1 to win the 1970 FIFA World Cup.
             -- Penn Central declares Section 77 bankruptcy, largest ever US corporate bankruptcy up to this date.

June 24 – The United States Senate repeals the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.

June 28 – U.S. ground troops withdraw from Cambodia

Do You Dream?

Of course you do.  We all dream at least a little.  I don't know whether it's my age or my meds, but lately I've had some really good ones.  The kind that when you wake up you want try to etch it in your mind so you can remember it for awhile, even though it seems like some of the best ones are the ones you can't grab quick enough to remember.  The ones that flutter away with the alarm clock, forever to be gone.

I had one the other night that I thought was a bit unusual.  We were at the reunion -- all of us -- and I could see everybody as they look now, or I guess the way my dream world thinks they should look.  There was gray hair and wrinkles and pudginess everywhere, and I knew exactly who everyone was, even though they had changed.

I'm not sure what Freud would make out of that.  Acceptance of my age?  A sign that no matter how much we cling to memories of the "good old days", they are just memories, not reality?  That my subconscious has a firmer grasp of things than my consciousness?  I don't know.  But I remember a few of them so it's going to be interesting to see how close my dream classmates are to the real ones I'll at the reunion.

Memorial For Those Now Gone

In conjunction with Memorial Day and our approaching 40th reunion, I thought it was time to remember those who started with us but are now gone.  They are missed and will always have a place in our hearts.

Remember When

A friend of mine used to say, "How would you like to own a ton of stock in a slide rule company when the calculator came along?"  Things change quick and become taken for granted, but at the time they were a big deal, huh?  We've talked about a lot of the major changes, but remember....

Coke in small bottles?
The first single wrapped slice of cheese?
Cheese in a can?
Sandwich bags, then..
Zip lock sandwich bags?
Twist ties on sandwich bread (we always called it light bread )?
Pull tabs on soda and beer cans?
Disposable lighters?
Disposable razors?
Disposable diapers?
When gas first went to 50 cents?
Bucket seats were an option in some cars?
When Interstate 75 used to stop at Lenoir City?
When there was no Interstate 75 at all?
Boys never wore jeans to church or school?
Girls always wore dresses to church and school?
Hushpuppy shoes came and went?
Hang Ten shirts came and went?
There was a Lenoir City Banner?
Members Only jackets came and went?

And a whole host of others.  We've seen a lot in almost 60 years haven't we?

Puberty Was Hell

I've probably mentioned this a few times, but bear with me, I'm getting to where my mind is slipping and I'm too lazy to look back at the posts.  Puberty was hell.  I think it started around the 5th or 6th grade, give or take a semester.  You know, when your friends asked you, "Who's your girlfriend?", and you answer Mary or Peggy or Linda or Patsy or whoever else might be catching your attention that week.  The thing is Mary or Peggy or none of those other girls knew a thing about it because you're not going to say anything to them, right?

One of these days I want to ask one of the ladies how it was from their side, because from mine it was pretty mixed up.

Anyway, you mooned over her, trying to convince yourself that she would be the one, you were sure of it.  All she had to do was fall into your arms, which obviously never happened.  Especially since she didn't know a thing about it and even if she did, you wer so far under her radar she rarely notices you at all.

Ever notice that?  Most moony eyed guys went after the prettiest, most popular girl in school.  The one that logically they would have the least chance of ever being seen with.  Why is that?  The fear of rejection so strong they went where  they were sure to get it quickest?  How many movies did you watch where you were the hero and she was the leading lady?  The same with books, you were the hero and she was your main squeeze.

What brings me to all this, is that would you even dare tell her now that you had a crush on her in the 6th or 7th or 8th or (fill in the blank) grade?  There you go, tempting the gods of puberty again.  One last rejection before you ride of into the sunset.  As for me, I'm not going to say a word.  Those memories are as sweet to me as my first time of catching a trophy sized fish or jumping off a rope swing into the deepest part of rhe river or driving your very first car on your very first date.  After all, she's still not going to say those magic words... "You did?  I had one on you too."

Let it All Hang Out

As I've said before, I've heard Sylvia, Donna, Brenda, Kathey and Pat say how much fun it was to get together and laugh and remember.  I've also had Brenda tell me that at the meetings they have laughed so hard.  Laughing when they're actually working to put this reunion together.  Imagine that.

I've also heard many people say our 20th reunion was the best, and I totally agree.  There were a lot of people, some I hadn't seen since we graduated, and not once did I hear anybody talking about their job or their car or any other possession.  I only heard them talk about how much fun it was and how good it was to see everyone.

The reason for all this is obvious, or at least it is to me.  Contrary to what we might think or do on a daily basis, it doesn't take long to look at some of those familiar faces and forget about everything else, if only for a few hours.  As my oldest son used to say when he was a teenager, "I'm psyched".  I can't wait to see everyone who's going to be there. 

If it's five or a hundred and five, I don't care -- although the more the merrier.  Because I think it's time we let our hair down and have a great big time.  We couldn't party back then the way the kids can now.  Going to the Bahamas on a senior trip? Are you kidding me!?  Can you imagine Edward Watson or Steve Knox or Wayne Poole in the Bahamas?  We're talking some serious fun here.

Okay, so we couldn't go there.  We can make up for it now.  We can talk, laugh, dance, laugh, sing, laugh, throw down a few drinks, and laugh some more.  I'm getting more ready every day.  It's time we let it all hang out.  We are way overdue.

Easy Come, Easy Go

Last night I spent more to fill up the gas tank of the van than I made in a month of working after school during senior year, and more than I made in half a month in the Air Force in 1972 when I was married with a baby.  Down right pitiful. 

I can remember Clyde Wagner telling us during senior year, "If you made more you'd only spend it."

He was right.

Looking Back -- May 1970

May 1 – Demonstrations against the trial of the New Haven Nine, Bobby Seale, and Ericka Huggins draw 12,000.  

May 1 – President Richard Nixon orders U.S. forces to cross into neutral Cambodia, threatening to widen the Vietnam War, sparking nationwide riots and leading to the Kent State Shootings.

May 4 – Kent State shootings: Four students at Kent State University in Ohio are killed and 9 wounded by Ohio State National Guardsmen, at a protest against the incursion into Cambodia.

May 6 – Arms Crisis in the Republic of Ireland: Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney are dismissed as members of the Irish Government, for accusations of their involvement in a plot to import arms for use by the Provisional IRA in Northern Ireland.

May 8 – Hard Hat riot: Unionized construction workers attack about 1,000 students and others protesting the Kent State shootings near the intersection of Wall Street and Broad Street and at New York City Hall.

May 8 – The Beatles release their 12th and final album, Let It Be.

May 9 – In Washington, D.C., 100,000 people demonstrate against the Vietnam War.

May 11 – Henry Marrow is murdered in a violent hate crime in Oxford, North Carolina.

May 11 – An F5 tornado hits downtown Lubbock, Texas, the first to hit a downtown district of a major city since Topeka, Kansas in 1966; 28 are killed.

May 14 – In the second day of violent demonstrations at Jackson State University in Jackson, Mississippi, state law enforcement officers fire into the demonstrators, killing 2 and injuring 12.

May 17 – Thor Heyerdahl sets sail from Morocco on the papyrus boat Ra II, to sail the Atlantic Ocean.

May 23 – A fire occurs in the Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait in north Wales, contributing to its partial destruction and amounting to approximately £1,000,000 worth of fire damage.

May 24 – The scientific drilling of the Kola Superdeep Borehole begins in the USSR.

May 26 – The Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial transport to exceed Mach 2.

May 27 – A British expedition climbs the south face of Annapurna I.

May 31 – The 1970 Ancash earthquake causes a landslide that buries the town of Yungay, Peru; more than 47,000 people are killed.

May 31 – The 1970 FIFA World Cup is inaugurated in Mexico.

Reunion Etiquette and Other Dos and Don’ts

August will be here before you know it, so I thought it might be a good idea to review some of the things you should or shouldn’t do during the night.

Do not say “Damn man, what happened to your hair?” to any guy that might be a little thin on top.

Do not talk about anybody’s hair, wrinkles and waistline, unless your hair is still naturally the color it was 40 years ago, you have no wrinkles, AND you can still fit in the clothes you wore in high school. Be prepared to prove the last one.

If you are sitting around a table trying to guess who’s who as they walk thru the door, don’t jump up and down too much if you’re right or slam your fist on the table too hard if you’re wrong. The person coming in the door might get the wrong idea.

Learn to hug by leaning forward, in some cases it will be necessary.

For the most part, you will still feel like you did 40 years ago, but everybody you see will look at least a little bit different, and in some cases, a lot different, so try not to walk around with a shocked expression on your face.

If, by some quirk of nature, you still look fairly close to what you did 40 years ago, don’t flaunt it.

If you don’t want people looking too closely at you, come early. Get there before they do and look at them closely.

Try to limit expressions that start with “Oh my God”, especially when it prefaces a comment related to who you’re talking to or about. It’s okay to use the expression if you are having a religious experience.

Do hug a lot.

Do laugh a lot.

Pick at least one person to really get reacquainted with, or chat a bit to someone you didn’t know that well way back when.
Tell as many as you can how good it is to see them, and mean it.

Trade email addresses, or phone numbers, or pictures, or recipes or golf tips.

When it’s noisy with talk and laughter, close your eyes for a moment and see if the hubbub sounds anything like it did 40 years ago.

And, don’t forget the biggest rule of all…. Show up!

I am Different

Are you a product of your upbringing? Do your values mirror those of your parents? If you lived in a different place, even a different neighborhood, do you think you would have been any different?

When I was growing up, a southern Democrat was a conservative, just too damned stubborn to call himself a Republican. Some of them were still holding it against Lincoln, so there's no way they'd belong to the same party. The adults who were around when I was growing up were that way. They wouldn't tell you, heck no! Saying who you voted for was something like the 11th Commandment. "Thou shalt not say who got your vote!" But they didn't have to. Everything they said before and after the election told you all you needed to know. I have fluttered from one back to the other until I figured there wasn't a whole of difference between them. I am a moderate, so in that regard I guess I buck my upbringing.

I'm religious, to a point. I'm no bible thumper and rarely get into discussions on the subject. But I know what I think and I believe and trust in God.  The folks I grew up around, on the other hand, would always tell you very quickly how wrong you were and that you were going to "burn in hell?" Oh, and they've been saying since I was old enough to go to church that Jesus is coming back tomorrow, and as I approach 60 I think I've finally figured out that they don't know any more than I do. But I am totally different in that regard now, because I'm... Catholic! I know several people who must be spinning in the graves to hear me say that.

There is no getting around the fact that I was brought up poor. Heck, a lot of folks in and around Loudon shared that distinction with me. I can remember not eating, getting one pair of shoes a year and more than a few bare Christmases. Now, I'm not rich by any stretch of the imagination, but my kids didn't have to worry about that kind of stuff. It wasn't my parents fault. They played the cards they were dealt. But sometimes I wonder if I had stayed in Loudon if I would be able to say that I did better. I love that little one horse town, but of all the things I left behind, the preconceived notion held by me and everyone around me about how I would turn out was one that I'm glad I did.

So, as far as how things turned out, I would have to say I'm almost totally different. However, one thing that I have not lost, and never will, is the pride and love I have for that place and the people who touched my life. And in some ways, that cancels all the changes in me.

What Once Was --- Is

I seldom drove in high school.  Since then I've put 125,000+ plus miles on 8 different vehicles.  I figured it up the other day and I am at or near a million driving miles.  But in the last few years I seldom drive anymore than it takes to get back and forth to work or to church, not withstanding a few trips here and there to see the kids or visit Loudon.

Almost every Sunday in high school I was at church.  Usually twice, and then again on Wednesday.  Then there were a bunch of years with a lot of forgiving and forgetting packed into them.  I figure I'm like everybody else.  There's some things I wish I could take back and other things I wish I had done differently, but what's done is done.  Now I'm back in church every Sunday and a lot of times in between.  Heck, I've even worked a bunch of ministries and chaired a few.

In high school a some of you guys were around almost everywhere I went.  In between I lost track of many of you for long stretches at a time.  Over the past few years I've gotten closer to more of you again.  Not to come around and hang out or be a pest, but just to be there if you ever want to reminisce or just talk.

Funny how that works out, huh?  Life takes you to different places all the time, but in some ways, it's really not all that different.

Things We Will Never Do Again

A whimsical, yet semi-serious look at some of the things we will never do again.

Make crank phone calls… “Is your refrigerator runnin’?” or “Do you have Prince Edward in a can?”
Fill up your car for $5 of less.
Watch a black and white TV
Use a rotary phone
Use a party line
Shop at the White Store or Stop and Shop
Drive past Jackson School
Stop by Richeson’s, or Five to Five, or Bowman Porters,.
Watch a movie at Cole’s Drive In
Get a haircut from Ted Watts
Get a frosty mug of A&W root beer at the west end A & W drive in.
Go to Davis Ferry.
Walk across the river bridge.
Buy the latest album at Tic-Toc's.
Catch a train at the depot or a Trailways bus at Richeson's.

I'm sure all of you can make your own list. It brings a sad little smile doesn't it?

A Look Back - April 1970

April 1 – President Nixon signs the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act into law, banning cigarette television advertisements in the United States, starting January 1, 1971.
April 1 – American Motors introduces the Gremlin.
April 8 – A huge gas explosion at a subway construction site in Osaka, Japan kills 79 and injures over 400.
April 8 – Israeli Air Force F4 Phantom II fighter bombers kill 47 Egyptian school children at an elementary school in what is known as Bahr el-Baqar massacre. The single-floor school was hit by five bombs and two air-to-ground missiles.
April 10 – Paul McCartney announces that the Beatles have disbanded, while at the same press conference, announcing the release of his first solo album. The Elton John album is released, the second album by Elton John, but the first to chart and the first to be released in America.
April 11 – Apollo 13 (Jim Lovell, Fred Haise, Jack Swigert) is launched toward the Moon.
April 13 – An oxygen tank in the Apollo 13 spacecraft explodes, forcing the crew to abort the mission and return in 4 days.
April 17 – Apollo program: Apollo 13 splashes down safely in the Pacific.
April 22 – The first Earth Day is celebrated in the U.S.
April 24 – China's first satellite (Dong Fang Hong 1) is launched into orbit using a Long March-1 Rocket (CZ-1).
April 26 – World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is formed
April 29 – The U.S. invades Cambodia to hunt out the Viet Cong; widespread, large antiwar protests occur in the U.S.

The Last One... Maybe... or at Least for Now

Pep talk that is.

Reasons not to come to the reunion:
1. It's too far to drive.
2. It's always in the same old place.
3. I don't like someone who might show up.
4. I didn't like anybody anyway, no matter who shows up.
5. I don't like the way it is handled.
6. My wife is pregnant... and due to deliver.
7. I'm pregnant and due to deliver.
8. I look terrible and don't want anyone to see me.
9. I have grey hair and wrinkles
10. I'm too fat
11. I'm too skinny
12. It's my anniversary
13. It's always the same old people, each and every time.
14. I'm not the stud I used to be.
15. I'm not the knock out I used to be.
16. We're going to be on vacation.
17. I promised I'd take my wife out to dinner that night. (I actually heard that one once)
18. I don't have a thing to wear.
19. I'm going to have surgery.
20. I've fallen and I can't get up.

Why those don't matter.
1. Then take a bus or a plane. We're worth it.
2. It's where the most people want it to be, the place we shared. Bang! Right off the bat we have something in common. Something to break the ice.
3. Then shy away from them and lean toward someone/some people you do like.
4. Then show up so we won't talk about you. Flaunt it if you have to, just show up.
5. Then jump right in there and help handle it another way.
6. At your age?
7. At your age, too?
8. We all have changed. Compared to what we used to look like, we're all down a notch or two, but guess what? It doesn't matter.
9. Don't we all?
10. So am I. :) But only if being as big as a house is too fat.
11. At our age I don't think there's such a thing as too skinny.
12. Then bring them along. You can sneak off together later.
13. There is nothing wrong with someone who enjoys being around old friends. Give it a chance for heaven's sake.
14 Who is? For that matter, who was?
15. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and in the memories of some good old friends.
16. What better place to have a good time? Plus, it's cheaper than Disney World and a lot less crowded.
17. So? Take her out afterward. Or, take her out before and bring us the doggy bag.
18. Then wrap a towel around your middle, pull up close to the door, crank down your window, and we'll come outside to talk to you.
19. We'll help you prep beforehand, or mend afterward.
20. Then we'll get you a walker. :)

Listen, I know that the 40th doesn't have quite the luster of the 50th, but it's here now, and so are we. We've lost a bunch of classmates si far and who knows what the next 10 years hold?,

So, please be there. Fly, drive, swim, run, walk, hobble, crawl or call some of us and we'll carry you. We want to see you.

I Fell in Love Today

Or, maybe it was just some mid life crisis type thing.

I was behind this new Dodge Challenger, and I started to wonder how it would drive, how the motor would sound, and how I'd look behind the wheel. Really, it wasn't that far removed from when I was 16 and eyeing a '68 Challenger.

Just like back then I thought it was a sweet looking car, the body lines so perfect.

And I would almost bet that Sue's objections to it today wouldn't be that far removed from the objections I heard back then. It's too pricey, the insurance would be outrageous, you don't need to be driving a car like that, how could you afford to keep gas in it, and on and on.

And my answers would be almost like they were back then... who cares?!?!? It's a great looking car! You're not ever going to have anything if you keep talking yourself out of it.

So who knows, come reunion time you might see me coming driving up in a big shiney.... family van. :)

I Think We're Moving

If all of you haven't heard yet, Delphia is getting things started on the reunion. She's trying to set up a meeting where everything can be discussed. From what I understand, the meeting is open to anyone who wants to show up with constructive ideas.

As I see it, we have 90 days to put this thing on solid ground, so everyone open up and lets's work together on this thing. The school has been mentioned as the location, and I think that is both convenient and affordable for everyone.

I think we should try and pack the house. I know everyone won't show up, but heck we can try. I know we've been beating the bushes for awhile now, but we need to turn that up a notch. Everyone who knows someone else, whether they have email or not, track them down and get them pumped up about it too. Obviously, we can't beat them to death about it, but we can be consistent.

What do you say? Let's pump it up!

Going to the Movies

The Oscars are almost here and the movie, “That Evening Sun” that has gotten some attention, was filmed right there in our neck of the woods. I think primarily in and around Knoxville and Roane County. Anyway, I will probably watch it the first chance I get just to see if anything looks familiar. Which brings to mind a question --- are there any movies that remind you of Loudon and the surrounding area, either the way it is now or the way it used to be? They don't have to be filmed near Loudon, just remind you of it.

I can name a few.

Wild River. A 50s movie that dealt with damming the Tennessee River.
Deliverance. Not the “squeal like a pig” part, but the scenery.
October Sky.
The Legend of Boggie Creek. But without the monster.
Thunder Road.
Foxfire. John Denver, Hume Cronin and Jessica Tandy
The Education of Little Tree.

Can you think of any more?

A Look Back - March 1970

March 1 – Rhodesia severs ties with the United Kingdom, declaring itself a racially segregated republic.
March 5 – The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty goes into effect, after ratification by 43 nations.
March 6 – A bomb being constructed by members of the Weathermen and meant to be planted at a military dance in New Jersey, explodes, killing 3 members of the organization.
March 6 – Süleyman Demirel of AP forms the new government of Turkey (32nd government)
March 12 – Teenagers in the United Kingdom vote for the first time.
March 15 – The Expo '70 World's Fair opens in Suita, Osaka, Japan.
March 16 – The complete New English Bible is published.
March 17 – The United States Army charges 14 officers with suppressing information related to the My Lai massacre.
March 18 – General Lon Nol ousts Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia.
March 18 – United States Postal Service workers in New York City go on strike; the strike spreads to the state of California and the cities of Akron, Ohio, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Chicago, Boston, and Denver, Colorado; 210,000 out of 750,000 U.S. postal employees walk out. President Nixon assigns military units to New York City post offices. The strike lasts 2 weeks.
March 20 – Agency for Cultural and Technical Co-operation (ACCT) (Agence de Coopération Culturelle et Technique).
March 21 – The first Earth Day proclamation is issued by San Francisco Mayor Joseph Alioto.
March 25 – The Concorde makes its first supersonic flight (700 mph 1,127 km/h).
March 31 – NASA's Explorer 1, the first American satellite and Explorer program spacecraft, reenters Earth's atmosphere after 12 years in orbit.
March 31 – Japan Airlines Flight 351, carrying 131 passengers and 7 crew from Tokyo to Fukuoka, is hijacked by Japanese Red Army members. All passengers are eventually freed.

Are You the You, You Used to Be?

In the last year and a half, we’ve lost two classmates and at least three others have had some serious situations. Also, there have been a few in the classes either side of us who have passed. I’m not trying to bring up a morbid subject here, but it brings to mind a question --- one that might be a touch out of line.

Do things like that affect you? Why?

Can I venture a guess? Yes, they do, and there are two main reasons. First, it is a reminder of our own mortality and second, even if they are not related to you, you know them. Notice I said know them, not knew them. Obviously, people change, but have you ever said that you “knew” a classmate? If I asked if you ever heard of Donna Morgan, most of you would say, “I know her.” Yes, there are some who wouldn’t say that, but I think most of us would. I know I would answer that way.

And that’s my point. We know each other, even now. Oh, I know that we’ve gotten older and there is this middle age veneer where our fresh teen selves used to be, but we still know each other. The soul of our friendship has not changed, and I bet if we were sitting in a room chatting, it wouldn’t take but a very few minutes to start feeling comfortable with each other again. I’ve experienced this. The evening with Donna, Brenda, Kathey, Sylvia and Pat was a blast. We couldn’t stop talking and laughing. We were the loudest table in the restaurant!

You guys were not my friends, you guys are my friends. I know I’ve been riding this horse for a long time, but if I didn’t really feel that way, I wouldn’t keep saying it. Obviously, if two people didn’t like one another in high school they most likely won’t now. I also realize there are exceptions to every rule, but it’s close enough to fact to be called one.

When one of our classmates pass, you feel sad don’t you? You might even cry. You don’t feel that way for people you don’t know.

The reunion is coming. Be there